WILMINGTON, Del. - Senior Amanda Stratton scored her first-career goal in the 51st minute, but Delaware responded with the equalizer in the 74th minute and game-winner in the 104th minute to hand the Lehigh women’s soccer team a 2-1 defeat on Sunday afternoon. The Mountain Hawks (2-2-1) will look to bounce back on Friday when they return home to host Villanova at 7 p.m.

 

“We need to be able to play in these types of [close] games,” said Lehigh head coach Eric Lambinus. “These are what Patriot League games are like. Games come down to one moment here or one moment there. We need to be able to execute in the moment. We had a couple chances in overtime where I think we should’ve put one away and next thing you know, they come back and score.”

 

Delaware tallied the first two corner kicks, and shots, within the game’s first four minutes, but both shots went wide. The Mountain Hawks responded with the game’s next eight shots. Junior Sabrina Mertz fired Lehigh’s first two shots, but both were stopped by Blue Hens’ goalkeeper Kailyn Rekos in the 13th then 15th minutes. Mertz fired another shot on goal in the 30th minute, but the teams went into halftime scoreless.

 

Lehigh continued the pressure early in the second half as senior Adrian Vitello hit a post in the 50th minute, but less than a minute later, Stratton scored to give the Mountain Hawks a 1-0 lead. After the ball was served towards goal, freshman Lisa Kestelboym won the ball by the back post, leading to Stratton’s first-career goal.

 

In the 68th minute, the Blue Hens recorded their first shot in 64:04, but sophomore goalkeeper Sam Miller was there to make the save. However, less than six minutes later, Delaware pulled even at the 73:25 mark.

 

The Mountain Hawks recorded three of the four shots in the first overtime, but in the second overtime session, Delaware’s Riley Dixon rocketed a shot to give the Blue Hens a 2-1 win.

 

Final shots were 14-8 in favor of Lehigh while each team had six corner kicks. Miller finished with one save across Rekos, who made four.

 

“We just didn’t finish or defend the way we’re used to defending,” said Lambinus. “We challenged our team to be better than we were last year. I think we are. We just need to find a way to win these games.”

 

Lehigh returns home on Friday to host Villanova at 7 p.m. before heading to St. John’s on Sunday (7 p.m.).

 

“We’re going into a weekend against two teams from the Big East,” said Lambinus. “They’ll both be as good or better than the teams we’ve played. We need to concentrate on playing better. We were prepared; we just need to execute better. We’re going to focus on playing better in the key areas and we’ll be fine.”

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